Patient care in hospitals and other treatment settings can include active monitoring of various physiological parameters of a patient, especially with regard to infusion of various types of fluids delivered by one or more infusion devices.
Dose error reduction software (DERS) can be used with infusion devices (e.g. an infusion pump systems) for delivery of drugs, fluids, and other therapeutic substances (hereinafter referred to generally as “drugs”). A general goal of DERS is improvement in the safety and clinical utility of infusing intravenous drugs and fluids. A typical DERS system may be configured to allow creation of customized care areas. As used herein, the term “care area” can refer to a physical location or multiple locations within a hospital or other clinical care setting (hereinafter referred to generically as a “hospital”). For example, a care area can be defined as a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), an intensive care unit, a trauma ward, etc., and such designations can be tied to physical locations (e.g. constrained within a specific location or locations within the hospital), or more generally to refer to a general class of patient, such as for example adult medical/surgical. Within a care area, one or more settings, such as for example custom device configurations, minimum and maximum hard and or soft limits per drug or fluid to be delivered, and the like may be established for an infusion device.